Micro Transactions

With the advent of the Xbox One and the Playstation 4 past some interesting discussions have come up about microtransactions. In the past few years we have seen a very strong move towards purchasing models based upon microtransactions and free to play. This was typified by the launch titles on the Xbox One. Both Forza Motorsport 5 and Ryse: Son of Rome heavily featured microtransactions, with Ryse featuring scarily pay-to-win purchases and Forza allowing you to skip most of the progression system in the game via purchases such as paying a whopping 37 dollars for the most expensive car in the game. The even sadder truth is that both of those games are 60 dollars at a standard price point. So not only do you have to pay 60 dollars but you can end up paying more than twice that in the games themselves. You can read some more about that here.

Another interesting event has happened that correlates to the increase in microtransactions seen in recent years.Silconera, the developer of Dead or Alive (DoA) have just announced that they are placing a limit on the amount of money you can spend on microtransactions in the most recent titles of both DoA and Dynasty Warriors. This limit will only apply to kids and young adults and it will be a set amount of money per month. The older you are the more you can spend. I think that this is an interesting business practice and I actually have to applaudSiliconera for this move. It shows that they actually care about their fanbase and don